"Should I See the Doctor that My Lawyer Recommends?"

Only if you want to wreck your case.

If you want your case to hold some level of legitimacy if it goes to trial, you need to be extra careful in following this advice. Insurance companies are watching you, and odds are they know much more than you would think they do! Your personal injury attorney may think he’s being sneaky by sending you to “his guy” and setting up the pitch for a home run (to his bank account!) but he may also be closing your case essentially before it even begins.

This is what personal injury attorney Ben Glass usually describes as “The Kiss Of Death”. There’s a great chance that this will sink your Williamsburg Virginia personal injury case, leaving you no chance to swim!

This is a deadly pitfall, and it’s sad that a lot of doctor-lawyer relationships like this exist. The responsibility is your own to avoid this! These referral relationships definitely tend to discredit you and your attorney if you end up going to trial.

"My Attorney Wants to Charge Me 40% of My Recovery, Is That Fair?"

We think it's crazy to charge 40% to settle a car accident case. Some firms even add a "file processing fee" on top of that. Here at BenGlassLaw, we have a graduated system where we charge as little as 25% up to 90 days prior to trial. Even within the 90 day window, we still only charge 33% (in the majority of cases). Medical malpractice and disability cases are different.

"What's the Formula for a Personal Injury Settlement?"

The secret is that no such formula exists...

"Can I File a Lawsuit Myself for My Personal InjuryClaim?"

In some cases, you don't need a lawyer for your personal injury claim.I think two things must be true for most of these cases. One is that you had some limited duration of medical care. So you were in an accident, you either went to the Emergency Department or you saw your primary care physician shortly after the accident. You had some physical therapy or some follow-up treatment and then you have been discharged and when you’re discharged from care, you were back to full recovery. And second, these cases that contend to be settled with an attorney of those cases in which there’s no real dispute as to who was at fault.

You may be surprised to hear that the answer to this question is: yes, the insurance company may spy on you using video surveillance. We see this both in our personal injury practice and in our disability practice. Companies like Hartford are pretty famous for this.

So how can you avoid having your case destroyed by your insurance company spying with video surveillance? Well, the first thing is you have to be brutally honest with your own insurance company and with your lawyer about what the extent of your activity level is.

See, the people who have their cases destroyed by video surveillance tend to be the people who are exaggerating what they can and can’t do, or who are out right lying about their activity level and the extent of their injury. If you're involved in a disability case and you get an activities questionnaire from an insurace company where they ask you to chart your activities for the week, that’s a pretty good clue, at least in our experience, that they’re going to be attempting video surveillance with you.

They’re going to compare what you write in your activities chart with what they catch on video surveillance. If Hartford wants you do a field visit and sit down with in your house or your attorney’s office, typically that means they are already do have you on video surveillance. So, again if you're telling your insurance company or telling the defense lawyer in a personal injury claim, that you can’t do certain things, and they catch you on a video surveillance doing any of these things, yeah that’s going to destroy your case, but it’s not because of what they’ve done, it’s because of your misrepresentation of your activity level.

"Which Insurance Company Should Pay My Medical Bills?"

This Video Explains Everything

"Should I see a chiropractor or a medical doctor after an accident? Which will be better for my case?"

You should go to the health provider that you deem best for your recovery.

But...if the question is whether or not you are going to be able to recover for extended chiropractic care after an accident, then we can tell you that you are almost certainly not going to recover for extensive chiropractic care when there is a board certified orthopedist on the other side. This statement is based upon not only our own experience but in interviews of and comments made by local judges and bailiffs (court officers who have watched many, many cases).

So, our advice to you is that you should be seen shortly after an accident by a medical doctor in the emergency department, your own primary care medical doctor or an orthopedist to both document your injury and establish a plan of care.